


Ascension Apprehension

by MagitekUnit05953234



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Fix-It of Sorts, Fluff, M/M, Mild Angst, Post-Canon, Post-Dawn, Prompto Argentum-centric, big damn kiss, discussion of religion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-13
Updated: 2018-10-13
Packaged: 2019-08-01 14:37:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16286420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagitekUnit05953234/pseuds/MagitekUnit05953234
Summary: Prompto has been in this cathedral for ten minutes and is already ready to leave and never return.





	Ascension Apprehension

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt "gods" from Tumblr user raneam-o1's gothic prompt list.  
> Thanks to NekoAisu for helping me figure out what a certain character should wear because I have absolutely no idea what fashion is.

Prompto has been in this godsdammed cathedral for ten minutes and is already ready to leave and never return.

Prompto was never particularly religious. Sure, he knew the Six were as real as his own right hand, but he wasn’t the type to give offerings or go to worship on Wednesdays or anything. Until now, Prompto’s only experience with houses or worship was through TV and movies.

Prompto finds that he hates the real thing, though that may be an opinion based on some rather new religious developments on Eos.

“...we now give thanks to the Seven for carrying us through the Night, and to the Lightbringer for delivering us from the Scourge and the darkness.”

“It is done,” the congregation murmurs. Prompto stands up from his spot at the end of the last pew and exists as quietly as he can.

The Lightbringer. Gods, the hell does that mean? Who decided that Six became Seven the day the sun rose? Prompto would like to have some very choice words with whoever _that_ was.

He knew that Noctis would never be remembered as he was. It just wasn't realistic. Prompto _knew_ that Noctis would be idealized and idolized, that his image would warp  to with time until he was a regal and holy king from start to finish, not once a kid who would always talk about skipping class to go to the arcade but would never go through with it because he didn't want to disappoint Ignis.

But a _god_? Calling Noctis the seventh Astral, acting as if he somehow ascended and became the deity of the sun itself after he got ran through? The fuck? Couldn’t the people of the world just let him rest without making him into something they wanted and that he wasn’t?

Not a hint of the real Noctis is left in those services, just some weird Noctis-shaped expectation of holiness and righteousness. It makes Prompto sick to his stomach.

He just wants Noct back. _His_ Noct, not some god lording over wherever the hell the Astrals fucked off to once Ardyn died. Prompto wants the kid who could and absolutely _did_ fall asleep on top of a bathroom vanity more than once, head hanging into the sink. Prompto wants the prince who would hyperfocus so hard that he would fish both the day _and_ the night away if no one went out to check on him. Prompto wants the king who held his friends close at the end of the world's longest night and promised everything would be alright.

Prompto doesn’t want a fucking god watching over him from the heavens.

“Welcome back,” Ignis is sitting on the couch when Prompto comes back to their apartment, one hand occupied with reading and the other curled around a mug of tea. “You weren’t gone long.”

“I know,” Prompto hangs his jacket up by the door. “I don’t think I’m cut out for the church on Wednesdays kind of life. Left pretty quick.”

“Did you find what you were looking for?” Ignis turns his head up as Prompto walks by and Prompto drops a kiss onto his forehead before making his way to the kitchenette.

“I dunno,” Prompto searches the fridge for something to drink, eventually landing on a bottle of sweet blossom soda. “Maybe. It was kinda surreal.”

“Religion can have that effect on people,” Ignis sets his book aside as Prompto reenters the room.

“You went to services as a kid, didn’t you? I think you mentioned it once or twice before.”

Ignis considers, pushing up his visor with his free hand. “Tenebrae was quite the religious country by principle. I was raised a worshipper, but stopped going to services outside of holidays after I came to Lucis. Religion was a bit of an odd subject in the Citadel and I didn’t care to continue my observance without an adult guiding me to do so.”

“I think I probably coulda been into the whole Six worship if I had been introduced to it as a kid maybe,” Prompto sits next to Ignis and twists the cap off the soda. “But I’m too old to start doing it now. Especially since we kinda… met all the gods. Not very impressed, honestly. Most of ‘em are jerks.”

“That they are.”

Prompto is halfway through his soda before Ignis brings up the inevitable.

“What did they have to say about the Lightbringer?”

“Oh _man_ ,” Prompto drinks to give himself time to think. “I think I hate all of that. Just straight up. No matter what it’s just. It’s _wrong_. It’s not Noct. I didn’t even stay long enough to hear half of it.”

“I understand,” Ignis sips his tea. “Noct never wanted to be a prince, much less a god. Wherever he is, I can’t imagine he’d be very happy about all of this.”

“Yeah,” Prompto rests his head on Ignis’s shoulder. “He’d hate it more than me, I think.”

That night, laying in bed between his two boyfriends, Prompto wonders about the afterlife. It was something he tried not to think about when he was younger, preferring the idea that everything just _stopped_ when you die. But there has to be something, right?

Prompto hates the thought of Noctis just _stopping_.

* * *

 

When Prompto dreams, he is in the cathedral once again. It’s still and silent, the kind of quiet where Prompto hates to even _breathe_ because he’s spoiling it. Colored light filters into the sanctuary through stained glass, only recently repaired after the Night.

Prompto likes it much better here without a priest and congregation. He wishes he had his camera.

It takes longer than it should for Prompto to realize he isn’t alone. Something is standing up on the altar, back toward the pews.

It could be a person, but Prompto is really hesitant to say that because most of its profile is obscured by two sets of wings, dark and feathered like a crow. The top ones are outstretched, massive and powerful. The lower ones are smaller and pointed toward the ground, the tips reaching just a foot or so out from the thing’s torso. The feathers drip ornamental chains and jewelry, each item draped over the black feathers with care.

The thing looks humanoid enough from behind, but Prompto’s never seen a nine foot tall person with massive wings before. So it’s _not_ a person.

Unless… it is and it’s just _not human_.

“H...hello?” Prompto calls without meaning to.

The Astral turns, and Prompto _knows_.

The god is quite literally radiant, emanating light as if he himself is a star above. He’s clothed in a flowing white top, cinched at the waist and closed in the front with laces. His pants are black, form-fitting without being obscenely tight. He’s barefoot, and there’s a little golden bracelet around his left ankle.

Every part of him is adorned with gold trinkets, rings and bracelets and earrings that glitter in the light. The most impressive is the crown nestled in his long silvery-black hair. It’s an elegant half-circle of aurous spikes, looking for all the world like a stylized depiction of the dawn.

It occurs to Prompto that that must be exactly what it is.

Noctis, the Lightbringer, god of the dawn, the sun, and the circle of life and death, smiles. “Wake up, Prompto.”

* * *

 

Prompto scrambles out of bed, tumbling up and over Gladio. Prompto earns a mumbled curse for his efforts, and he apologizes quietly as he stumbles over to the bedroom door and yanks it open, pulling on a tee shirt he grabbed off the floor at random. It’s Gladio’s, and hangs off Prompto’s frame as if he’s playing dress-up. Prompto would mind ordinarily, but this isn’t an ordinary morning.

It takes too long and yet not long enough for Prompto to make his way to their front door. The whole apartment is dark, with the approaching sunrise just barely lighting the sky outside the windows to a vague grey. Prompto stubs his toe on the couch and loses precious seconds cussing over the momentary pain.

When Prompto stands in front of the door, one hand tight on the knob, he has to take a moment. He knows who is out there. He knows what he’ll be opening the door to. He sniffs and wipes his free hand across his already stinging eyes.

The man standing on Prompto's doorstep doesn't look particularly divine. He wears a black hoodie and jeans, and there’s no hint of wing nor crown nor godly stature nor glow. Nonetheless, he’s the same. His blue eyes shine when his lips quirk up, and he waves a hand.

“Hey,” Noctis says. Noctis the Messenger, Noctis the man who died two years ago, Noctis the king and the prince and the kid and the god. Both the deity worshipped across Eos _and_ the first human who ever saw Prompto as someone worthy of love. He’s Prompto’s Noct, and he’s beautiful. “I missed you.”

Kissing him feels like coming home.

**Author's Note:**

> Follow me on Twitter [@compromisedunit](https://mobile.twitter.com/compromisedunit)!


End file.
